On a snowy Christmas Eve a few years ago, Raymond E. Woollard was watching television with his family when he heard someone tapping at the windows of his Baltimore County farmhouse.

It was not Santa.

At the sound of breaking glass, Woollard dashed to his bedroom for a shotgun, and the holiday evening quickly became one of the most frightening nights of his life.

There was a hand-to-hand struggle for the weapon, but Woollard, with help from his adult son, eventually subdued the 6-foot-2, 155-pound intruder at gunpoint. Then they waited for more than an hour for police to find their way, on icy back roads, to the home, about 25 miles south of the Pennsylvania border.

That night made Woollard a crime victim for the first time in his life and also one of a select few Maryland residents to receive a license to carry a concealed handgun. But to Woollard's surprise, Maryland State Police denied his request last year to renew the permit, saying they thought the danger to his life had passed.

The agency said it was "because I hadn't been attacked" again, Woollard said in an interview. "They said, 'If you have any problems, you let us know.'"